


The Doctor Is Iggy

by abstractconcept



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Avs, Colorado Avalanche, Ducklings - Freeform, Gen, Gen Fic, Humor, Team Advice Guy, mention of S.T.D.s, mentoring, team fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-24
Updated: 2014-10-24
Packaged: 2018-02-22 11:26:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2506088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abstractconcept/pseuds/abstractconcept
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Avs brought Iggy in for leadership. He didn’t know what he was getting into.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Doctor Is Iggy

**Author's Note:**

> Relationships: None! This is a gen fic! *GASP*  
> Characters: Jarome Iginla, Gabe Landeskog, Matt Duchene, Tyson Barrie, Nate MacKinnon, Jonathan Drouin, Nick Holden, Dennis Everberg, Zach Redmond.
> 
> This is just a little Iggy ficlet (an Iglet?) about Jarome becoming the go-to guy for advice. Any kind of advice. LOTS OF ADVICE.
> 
> Here's hoping this helps Iggy get a point or two tonight!!!! My dad just called me and told me he got tickets to the game, so I guess we're going. Please, please, please, hockey gods, let them do better tonight!

The first week or so wasn’t too bad. The team was getting its feet, developing chemistry, feeling each other out. Patty had given him the A, and that was just fine with him. He was here to guide these kids, to turn them into winners. So he’d accepted the A with no reservations. 

Maybe he should have had a couple of reservations. 

On week number two, the questions started. The team was getting to know each other, figuring out how to work together, trying to find their feet. And some people wanted to run before they could walk. People were a little on edge, and Iggy knew that soon he’d be called upon to help out.

First up was Nate MacKinnon. The kid asked to talk with him on the plane. That was cool. Nate was an overachiever, wanting to do everything at once—be responsible in his own end, score ALL the points, even asked McLeod for fighting lessons. But this turned out to be different. When they sat down, Everberg tried to sit near them and Nate told him to buzz off—“This is a private conversation, okay?” With a shrug, Everberg buzzed off. 

“What’s up?” Iggy asked, ready for just about anything. 

“Well, it’s my girlfriend,” Nate said in apologetic sort of voice, and Iggy’s blood froze for a second. Holy hell, right off the bat? Teenage dating was not his area of expertise. 

“Uh, okay.”

“It’s just that we only met this summer, and now that the season started, she’s getting kind of . . .” Nate shrugged uncomfortably, his face twisted up. “I’m not around a lot, and she’s not real happy about it. I tried to tell her this is my job, but she just gets so angry, you know?”

Iggy blinked. Oh, wow, he was sure getting thrown right into the deep end. “Huh. Well, that’s . . . tough. Girls can be a tough thing to navigate. You wanna be sensitive, but you can’t let emotional stuff get you off your game, you know?”

Nate nodded unhappily. “She just keeps sending me texts and stuff . . .” he said sheepishly. 

Iggy smiled. “Well, there’s a new rule. Coach takes your phones at the beginning of every road trip. Gotta keep you focused. He reads your messages, even, and decides what’s important enough to tell you about.”

Nate’s eyes widened. “Uh, really?”

“No, but it should buy you some breathing room.” Nate lit up at this Machiavellian maneuver, and Jarome’s chest swelled just a little. Yeah, he still had something to offer these minnows. “In the meantime, how much do you hang with the other guys? I mean, you ever double date?”

“Yeah, a couple of times,” Nate replied with a quasi-shrug. His shoulders were enormous, probably looked even bigger because of the ill-fitting suit. 

“Well, good. Then here’s what you do. You pick a teammate you trust who’s been with the same girl for awhile. Explain your problem. Invite the two of them over for dinner with you and your girl. The other girl can take her aside and she can lay it out. Tell her what it’s like to be a hockey player’s girlfriend. If she’s a smart girl, she’ll cotton on quick. If not, it’ll take a few more girls. I could even have my wife talk to her, but she’ll probably relate better to someone her age. See, the thing about dating someone in hockey, it’s a little tiny bit like dating a soldier or something. You’re away a lot, and they kinda have to learn to fend for themselves. But they network and shit, and take care of each other. So they’ll take her under their wings, let her know how it works.”

Nate looked relieved. “That’s great. That’s a great idea! Oh, wow, thanks, Iggy.”

“Cool. Let me know, you get any other questions, okay?”

“Sure!”

Jarome relaxed in his seat, enjoying the vibrations of the plane. Yeah, this Avs thing, this was going to turn out just fine.

oOoOoOo

The next question was just as reasonable. Dutchy asked him for tips on getting people to listen to him. He knew the kid wanted to take on more responsibilities, play more of a leadership role. And Iggy understood, he really did. But the kid ran around a bit too much, tried to make too much happen.

“Well, it’s like this,” he told Duchene, “Let me tell you a secret about great captains: if you want people to pay attention when you talk, sometimes you actually have to say _less._ That way, when you do speak up, they’ll know what you have to say is important. Pick your battles,” he advised. “Don’t jump in every time. Give them a chance to come to you when they need it.”

Duchene nodded very seriously. “Okay,” he said. His eyes were big and shiny, the way they got when he was excited. “Thanks, man. That makes sense.”

“Anytime,” Iggy told him. He was pretty sure Matt was going to turn it into a mantra. Duchene was that type of guy. Determined, ambitious, and maybe just a little too inclined to sort his underwear drawer by what day of the week he planned to wear each pair. Like, if he’d been into school instead of hockey, Iggy just _knew_ he would have been the kind of kid to have color-coded notes, and index cards with important points, and he’d study for hours before each test and ask his friends to bring his homework when he was sick. He took hockey that kind of serious. So yeah, he’d not only listen, but he was very probably taking notes. But hey, he was a decent player, and Iggy always followed his own advice. Unless someone came to him, he kept his nose out of it.

Unfortunately, everyone started to come to him. After Duchene and MacKinnon, it was like someone had opened the floodgates. Nick Holden wanted to know how age had affected his game, and the sort of things he did to continue to stay in shape. That wasn’t so bad, but verged on too personal for his tastes. Then E.J. wanted to know how he shook off a bad play. Then Tyson Barrie asked Iggy to teach him how to drive a stick shift! They all said the same thing; _they say you give such good advice._

And Iggy didn’t mind giving it, but it was getting kind of crazy. He was getting phone calls while he was trying to do his daughter’s parent-teacher conference. Guys were showing up on his doorstep. Sometimes when he entered the locker room there was an actual fucking line of guys wanting to talk to him. 

By the time the month was out, Jarome had had enough. Dennis Everberg, the team’s young Swede, came to him when he was in the fucking shower and said, in heavily accented English, “Hey. Got a minute?”

Before Iggy could even rinse the soap out of his eyes, the guy went on, “I have problem. My mormor . . . my . . . grandmother. She really mad at me. She sent me some stuff for my birthday and, uh,” he said, “She is angry.”

“Angry?” Iggy repeated. 

“I did not make thank you card.”

Iggy blinked. Did he have soap bubbles in his ears? Was he hearing this shit correctly? “You want to know what to do about your _grandmother?_ ” 

The guy just stood there, shifting sheepishly from one foot to the other. 

For Chrissakes, he was fucking _naked_. He didn’t want to be standing there talking about someone’s crotchety grandmother. “Look, I don’t know, kid,” he said, letting exasperation get the better of him. “Bake her a fucking cake or something. I’m busy.” He squeezed past the guy and went to retrieve a towel. 

As he stood in front of the foggy mirror, looking very much his age, tired and wondering where he put his other sock, he couldn’t help shaking his head. 

Now they were asking about their motherfucking _grandmothers._ What next?

oOoOoOo

Two days later he got a call in the middle of the night. In the middle of the night! “Could you ask them not to call you at two in the morning?” his wife asked sleepily as he rolled over to grab the phone.

“Hon, it could be important,” he told her apologetically. But it wasn’t. It was, in fact, Evergberg again, and he sounded fucking elated. He was so excited that Iggy could barely understand him, with the Swedish accent and all. “You what? _What_ worked? It did? Your grandmother is happy? That was the cake she used to make with you when you were six? And she was so happy that you remembered that she started _crying?_ You’re _shitting_ me. No. It’s just an expression. Nah. Yeah. No, that’s great, kid. Look, from now on, could you save the phone calls for daylight hours? Yeah. No, I’m not mad. No, you don’t have to bake me a cake.” He disconnected and set the phone down on the nightstand. 

Iggy leaned back against the pillows. That was motherfucking crazy. “Can you beat that shit?” he asked his wife, but she didn’t answer. She’d fallen back to sleep. 

Iggy nestled down and tried to get comfortable. This shit was getting ridiculous.

oOoOoOo

A week later he was up early, standing on the cold bathroom tiles at six in the morning, shaving, when he got a call from an out of state number. Thinking it was important, he picked it up. “Yeah?”

“Hey, is this, uh, is this Mr. Iginla?”

 _Mr._ Iginla? What the crap? “Yeah,” he responded cautiously. “Who’s this?”

“Hi, we’ve never met. This is Jonathan Drouin. I’m really sorry to disturb you and all, but Nate gave me your number. He said you’re really, really good at figuring shit out. He says that whenever you give advice, if a guy follows it, it turns out great. So I was obviously hoping you could help me out with something.”

Iggy looked at his foam-covered face in the mirror. The shaving cream was all over his phone now. “Uh-huh,” he said on autopilot.

“Hey, great! So listen, there’s this guy—I’m obviously not gonna name names or anything—but there’s this guy I’m not getting on with so great. Like, he always wants to start shit with me. And he’s throwing some serious shade. Normally, obviously, I wouldn’t even let it get me but he’s like, getting personal with shit that’s none of his business. And it’s, like, getting under my skin. I gotta work with this guy and he’s making these insinuations and shit about my personal life and I obviously don’t know if he means it or he’s just blowing smoke up my ass and I don’t even care. But it’s like, shit, I obviously don’t want to lose it and like start throwing punches or anything but I’m not sure how to keep my cool. You got any ideas?”

Jarome let out a huff of air. “Yeah,” he said. “Call the guy up and discuss it with _him_ instead of ringing up some old man you don’t even know.” He hung up the phone. 

It rang again. 

Wild-eyed, he threw it in the toilet. It landed with a clatter and a splash. 

His wife popped her head in. “What was that?”

He smiled brightly at her. “Nothing. Just had a little accident. Gonna have to get a new phone. Maybe a new number.”

“Well, that’s silly. You can get a new phone without having to get a whole new—”

He grabbed her wrist and pulled her into the room and planted a big old foamy kiss on her cheek. “Gonna have to get a new phone number,” he assured her as she laughed and cleaned up her face. 

And he wouldn’t tell anyone, _anyone_ what that number was.

oOoOoOo

At the next practice, Nathan MacKinnon spotted him changing and made a bee-line for him. Iggy groaned. “Look, I’m sorry I couldn’t help your friend out,” he began, but the kid cut him off.

“No, hey, I just wanted to say thank you. I mean, he asked me to say thank you. I mean, he said what you told him helped a LOT. He said he took your advice yesterday and it all turned out really great. He said you’re the real deal and he’ll say so to anyone who asks.”

“What?” Iggy squawked. 

“Yeah, you’re a real class act, he said. He said he could understand why you’re this great leader that people look up to and all. He said you’ve really got it together. So yeah, that’s really cool. It was cool of you to help him out like that.” Nate grinned broadly. “I’m sure glad they traded you to us, ‘cuz I think that was a real good deal for us,” he said in a very sincere voice. 

“Yeah, thanks,” Iggy replied with a sigh. What the hell? Well, things turned out okay. At least it was over, right?

oOoOoOoOo

Unfortunately, his new number didn’t stay very private for very long. It became a running joke—Iggy’s phone tree and cable repair shop. Iggy’s sandwich and advice shop. Iggy’s 800 number. His wife told him that if only he charged, he’d be the richest man in the world. Kids were calling him from all over the fucking league now. Every little rookie that ever wet his bed had to give Iggy a call and find out how to get a girlfriend or break up with a girlfriend or how to tell his parents he was gay, or where to buy a gift for his picky mother-in-law’s birthday.

He was starting to get desperate when one young guy showed up on his doorstep after midnight, leaning heavily on the doorbell and looking somewhat frantic. 

“Yeah?” he said, opening the door reluctantly. He didn’t want the doorbell waking up the kids, or he wouldn’t have answered it. He was wearing his boxer shorts and a ragged old plaid robe. It was one of the AHL guys, a young kid they’d called up to eat nachos in case of an injury.

“Uh, hi.” The kid gulped, looking like a deer caught in the headlights. 

Oh, God. “What’s up?” he finally prompted. 

The next half hour was one that Jarome would not want to re-live under any circumstances. It started with a fairly harmless, “It’s kind of, um, I think I might have . . . uh, see, there was this girl, and I wasn’t, er, well, can I show you something in private?” and was eventually followed by, “So, does it look contagious to you?” and ended with Jarome, screaming, “GET YOURSELF TO A FUCKING DOCTOR, MAN! DO I LOOK LIKE A FUCKING DOCTOR TO YOU? WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU _SHOW_ ME THAT? WHAT THE HELL IS _WRONG_ WITH YOU?” 

Seconds after that the kid was pretty much sprinting out the front door, white as a ghost, still struggling with his zipper. Iggy slammed the door and fell back against it, looking up at the ceiling. 

“Why?” he asked out loud. “Why, God? Why me? What the fuck did I do to deserve this?” 

But then his wife called for him, asking him when he was coming back up to bed. He tried to pull himself together.

He headed upstairs, quietly trying to think of a way to tell his wife they were going to have to rip up his contract, change their identities, move away and find a fucking safe house.

oOoOoOo

The next day was a big game, and they won. It was great. Well, it should have been great. It would have been a whole lot greater if Iggy had been operating on more than a couple of hours of sleep, but he’d been up late the night before, worrying and wondering what the fuck had happened to his life.

Afterward he must have looked pretty fucking shell-shocked, because he was late to leave, sitting by his locker and staring at his sock, like it was gonna fucking do a dance or something. He must have been quite the sight, because even the most desperate kids were leaving him strictly the fuck alone. 

And he must have looked especially bad, because Gabe Landeskog ventured over and gave him a light punch on the shoulder. “You okay?” the Swede asked with worry in his blue eyes. 

Iggy blinked, coming back to himself. To his surprise, the locker room had completely emptied out while he’d sat there, dazed and confused. “Uh, no. I mean, I’m good. Thanks.”

Gabe dropped onto the bench next to him and looked at him with concern. He reached out and gave his shoulder a squeeze. “Talk to me, man. Something’s up.”

Jarome just stared at him. 

“It can be difficult to adjust to a new team, new town. Are you still having trouble adjusting? Or is someone giving you trouble?”

Iggy snorted. “Trouble? You’ve gotta be joking. I’m the most popular fucking guy in the whole goddamn league.”

Gabe grinned his movie-star smile. “I’ve noticed. Mr. Popularity over here, huh?”

Rolling his eyes, Iggy snapped, “You don’t even have a clue. It never fucking ends. Phone calls, locker room chats, guys showing up at my house, mail, email, you fucking name it. Everyone wants me to tell them what to do. You know what I want ‘em to do? _Shut up for five minutes._ That’s all I want anymore. Just five minutes’ peace!”

Gabe shrugged. “Well, yeah, but can you blame them? It makes them feel secure knowing someone who knows his shit has their back. Being on such a young team can be really nerve-wracking, because it’s all fun and games until you drop a keg on your buddy’s head and he’s not looking so good and it’s right about then that you really wanna have someone good on speed-dial, because with a bunch of jokers like this it’s fifty-fifty whether they call an ambulance or just grab some shovels and start trying to figure out where they’re gonna hide the body, you know?”

Iggy laughed. “That’s true enough,” he said wryly.

“Besides, who else are they gonna call? Hejda? His English is so bad they’d have to play charades to get their point across. Brad Stuart? You know, I was sitting down with him the other day, trying to get him to feel at ease, you know, just making conversation, and I asked him what his favorite food was. You know what he told me? _Toast._ Not, like, toast and jam, or French toast, or even fucking buttered toast, just, ‘toast.’ And he always has the same expression on his face. The guy has all the personality of a cardboard box.”

“I noticed that too.” Iggy started to giggle. He was tired—probably verging on fucking hysterical by this point. “I heard a reporter ask him what his hobbies were and he just fucking stared at them and said he didn’t have any hobbies. Every time he pulls that shit my mind starts playing back that speech in Jaws— _You know the thing about a shark, he's got... lifeless eyes, black eyes, like a doll's eye_. Frankly, I don’t want to know about that son of a bitch’s hobbies. ‘Cuz one day I think we’ll hear all about his hobbies when they find the chopped up torsos under the floorboards or some shit.”

Gabe laughed his typical Gabe laugh—head thrown back, uninhibited and carefree. Iggy sighed heavily. He wished he could be that _laissez_ -fucking- _faire_ about life.

“You know, you don’t have to answer the phone,” Gabe told him seriously. “If it’s getting to be too much, just say you don’t know the answer. They’ll take the hint.”

Smiling, Iggy looked Gabe over. He was a young pup, kind of cocky, but approachable and kind. He didn’t always know what to do, but he sure tried hard. “You know, you’re a pretty smart guy,” he commented. 

“Well, yeah,” Gabe agreed. “Gotta have at least two brain cells to rub together in order to be captain,” he said, looking overly sincere. “It’s in the rule book. They count them and everything.”

“No, I just mean . . .” Iggy looked down at his hands. They were good hands. Strong, accomplished, tough. And way too full. “I just mean, why don’t they ever go crying to you for answers about the meaning of life?”

The corner of Gabe’s mouth curled ruefully. “Everyone used to come to me for advice. Well, me and Pauly. But then Pauly got traded and . . . then you showed up.” He shrugged his massive shoulders and Iggy realized, with a shock, that Gabe was actually kind of jealous that some snot-nosed rookie wasn’t coming up to him, penis in hand, and asking him to play, ‘Do I have an S.T.D. or am I just allergic to my fabric softener?’

Iggy raised his eyebrows and searched his brain for some kind of tactful and compassionate response and came up empty. 

Gabe seemed to know what he was thinking though, because he turned his face away and, in a flattish voice, insisted that he didn’t really mind. “It’s cleared up my schedule a lot,” he added with fake cheer. “I had time to go shopping with my girl the other day. Lots of time,” he added in a voice that turned just a little grim. But then he popped to his feet suddenly, like a puppet jerked by a string, and his sunny Swedish smile was back in place. “Hey, I gotta go. But I mean . . . if you need anything, just call me,” he said hopefully. 

“Sure. Thanks for the talk.” Iggy shook his hand, a respectful gesture he wouldn’t have added for just anyone. He sat, watching Gabe’s hulking frame as he strode out of the room, his shoulders slumped just a little. As he finished getting ready to head out, Iggy kept turning it over in his mind. Gabe Landeskog, who probably wouldn’t even mind it, if Matty Duchene, embarrassed, came up to _him_ instead of Iggy, and wanted to explain that he was wearing boxers with little rocket ships on them because they were a _gift,_ and anyway he’d scored _two goals_ last time he wore them, and _how_ could he make O’Reilly stop laughing until he cried every time he saw them? Gabe probably wouldn’t even laugh—not much—only a little out loud—when he realized that the truth was that Dutchy actually, superstitiously, and _earnestly_ believed the fucking things made him go faster.

Then Iggy leaned back and looked around at the empty locker room, the Avs symbol beside his name, and Landeskog’s, and Joe Sakic’s locker, which had become more than a locker. It still had his name, but it wasn’t used. He’d heard that Landeskog had actually had to ask Adrian Dater to move once, when the journalist thoughtlessly sat there and upset the whole team. It wasn’t a locker now; it was empty, but filled with respect. 

And it occurred to Iggy that a captain couldn’t be a captain unless he was the one in charge of the ship. And in order to be in charge of the ship, people had to listen to him.

oOoOoOo

The next day, when Zach Redmond approached him, worried about taxes and retirement funds, Iggy gave him a zen smile.

“What do you think I should do?” Zach asked, his usually childlike-grin replaced by a frown of anxiety. 

Typically, Iggy would have told him to speak with a tax adviser. This time, he just held his palms up, a _beats me_ sort of gesture. “Man, I don’t have any ideas,” he said. Redmond looked crestfallen. “But Gabe went to some kind of seminar about that recently,” Iggy added. “Maybe you should ask him.”

Zach brightened. “Thanks! I’ll do that!”

It didn’t help _right_ away, of course, because by sending Redmond to Gabe it only cemented Iggy’s reputation for giving out good advice. But by being patient and repeating that he simply didn’t know the answer, but Gabe might, Iggy was able to steer more and more guys away. Sullen little brother? Iggy didn’t know, but Gabe had siblings, maybe he’d be able to say. Wanting a bigger role on the team? Seems like the captain should know something about that. Looking for a new training program? Iggy hadn’t changed his in years, but Gabe was a smart guy. He’d probably know where to start. 

Pretty soon they were going to Gabe of their own accord. Iggy knew they would. Gabe didn’t always have the answers, but unlike Iggy, he really _liked_ having guys come to him, and they responded to that. He was interested. He cared. 

That didn’t mean no one ever asked Jarome anything, but it cut everything back to a manageable portion. So he didn’t mind so much when Hejda, in broken English, discussed retirement, or Talbot wanted to know how to get Nate to clean up after himself. 

And soon Iggy had reached a blissful state free of other people’s problems. He could relax and focus on the game, like he was supposed to. On the flight back to Denver he unwound, looking lazily out the window and congratulating himself. He really _did_ give pretty good advice; he’d solved his own problems. The sun was setting and it was getting in his eyes, so he pulled the shade and let his head fall back against his headrest, dozing, a small smile still on his face. 

_Laissez_ -fucking- _faire_. It was nice.

oOoOoOoOo

That night he was asleep beside his beautiful wife when, after midnight, the doorbell rang. Concerned, he got up, shrugged on his robe, and padded downstairs and peeked through the hole. Gabe Landeskog was standing on his front step, looking ill-at-ease.

Iggy opened the door. “Hey, man, what’s up?”

Gabe squirmed, his face twisted up. “It’s kind of, um, I think I might have . . . uh, see, there was this girl, and I wasn’t, er, well, can I show you something in private?” 

Iggy stared at him. _Oh, no! Not AGAIN!_ he thought wildly. 

Gabe looked miserable. “Please?” he said, sounding pitiful.

Shrugging, Jarome gave in. “All right, come on in,” he said, stepping back. 

Gabe looked relieved, but uncertain. “Really?” he said, raising his eyebrows, the porch light turning his hair vividly yellow. 

Iggy heaved a sigh. “Yeah. I mean, before, I’d have had dozens of assholes on my front stoop, but at least this way it’s only one. I’ll trade the whole league for just having to deal with Gabe Landeskog,” he said. Besides, who did the captain turn to? Everyone needed someone. 

“I think I might need an ointment,” Gabe said, meekly following him into the house. 

Iggy laughed. “I don’t have an ointment, but I can get you the number of a good doctor,” he said. 

“Really?” Gabe replied hopefully.

“Sure,” Jarome told him with a grin. “Didn’t you hear? I’m all about referrals these days.”


End file.
